


New Hunger

by fascinationex



Series: transformers fics by fascinationex [31]
Category: Transformers - All Media Types, Transformers: Prime
Genre: Bottom Megatron, Mildly Dubious Consent, Other, Present Tense, Sex Pollen, Transformers Plug and Play Sexual Interfacing, Vehicons - Freeform, a minute soundwave cameo, crashed ship, sometimes Starscream gets to be competent
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-13
Updated: 2020-09-13
Packaged: 2021-03-07 01:46:49
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,369
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26438911
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fascinationex/pseuds/fascinationex
Summary: Starscream comes to amid a flood of errors flashing a bright, warning pink.
Relationships: Megatron/Starscream (Transformers)
Series: transformers fics by fascinationex [31]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1311599
Comments: 14
Kudos: 79





	New Hunger

Starscream comes to amid a flood of errors flashing a bright, warning pink.

For a long moment he doesn't know where he is. Sensors in his vents register the familiar scent of hot energon in the atmosphere, but it's nearly silent: no weapons discharge, no screaming, no thunderous footsteps or grinding metal of rapid transformation.

One of his optics flickers for a moment—another error—but soon both come on.

He is on his back, head twisted to the side, and all he can see before him is scuffed metal and the glow of an emergency lighting strip. It's all at a slightly peculiar angle. 

A crash?

There's solvent dripping somewhere. Is he... in the wash racks?

Something drips onto his neck.

Starscream rolls his head up.

He freezes. 

Blank optics stare right back down at him. 

Another slow drip of energon rolls over the mech's grey lip and plops delicately down onto his neck.

"Disgusting," croaks Starscream, vocaliser staticky, although he doesn't feel true disgust. He's too used to the war by now to get worked up over every incidental dead mechanism, no matter how close or drippy.

A glance reveals a sharp spike of broken metalwork, driven right through the vehicon's back and now emerging out the front of his chest—right through the spark chamber. A quick, messy death. It's probably only his body keeping Starscream from serious damage. 

It's hard to tell if Starscream should have recognised him: when they go grey, they're even less distinguishable than usual.

He grunts and shoves at the body, but the metal piece is pinning it in place, and Starscream doesn't have the leverage to move it. He squirms awkwardly out from beneath the grey shape instead. At least there doesn't seem to be anybody alive to witness him in this particular floundering, wiggling indignity.

The floor creaks, then, just as he's trying to avoid getting his aft scraped up on the spiky end of the debris, and he looks up to find two more vehicons staring down at him. 

He can feel his plating warm up, embarrassed. His vents crack open. Hot air blows out, disturbing the solvents puddled on the floor.

"What are you doing just standing there?" he snarls. "Help me up, you useless lumps!"

They scramble to hoist up the debris and its attendant dead frame long enough for Starscream to worm his way out.

He sees another error while climbing to his feet. It seems he hit his head hard on the way down. That accounts for his jumbled memory files.

Starscream wobbles on his thrusters for a moment. Then his spacial reasoning centre startes processing complete data again.

...It's fine. Probably. 

He looks around. They are indeed in the wash racks: a room of long, dark metal bays of spigots and hoses, solvent indicators, and dispensers of low quality cleaning products. The Nemesis, jewel of the Decepticon army, is much better equipped... but this ship, the Recidivist, is a smaller, faster one. These wash racks are entirely shared, which explains why Starscream seems to have ended up sharing a puddle with a bunch of vehicons.

There's a trickle of solvent running straight down the wall, and some of the pipes have been brought down too. 

"What's the status of the ship? And the location? Where is Megatron? Turn the solvent off at the source, and I want a full work—"

"Ah, Starscream," says Megatron's deep, hollow voice, cutting him off mid-sentence. The floor creaks some more as he lumbers closer, until he emerges in the doorway.

Starscream pauses.

Megatron lives, then. 

Starscream has... mixed feelings about that. Death in a ship accident is hardly fitting for the mighty Megatron, but on a bad day Starscream feels keenly that he'd take anything at this point. Megatron looms huge, both literally and in his mind, both glorious and terrible, and sometimes he torments himself with the fear that he'll never be free of him—not even when he's dead. 

But on a good day, of course... Well. He cuts the thought off and kills the whole process tree. He and Megatron haven't had a good day in so long that this is hardly relevant.

"Lord Megatron," he says.

The emergency lights illuminate Megatron's huge and powerful frame from below, casting ominous patches of darkness across his face. His red optics glow steadily out from the shadows.

"I should have known _you'd_ survive," Megatron notes, without much indication as to whether or not he feels Starscream's survival is a positive development. 

"It will take more than a little," he waves his hand vaguely at the dead vehicon, " _ship crash_ to deactivate me."

"So it would seem," drawls Megatron. "Damages to the Recidivist are extensive, and the atmosphere on this planet prohibits transmissions. There was once a research outpost on this planet—Autobot," he sneers a little with the word, like he cannot quite bring himself to say it without, "but it should be abandoned. I will seek resources there that will aid our repairs—and _you_ will get started on them here. Do not," Megatron adds in a growl, "indulge in any _bright ideas_ you may have in the interim, Starscream."

Starscream's wing twitches in dismay.

Megatron is waiting for him to agree, though. 

"...As you command, _mighty_ Megatron."

Megatron looks at him, long and suspicious and also—or so Starscream thinks, from long acquaintanceship—faintly annoyed about being so suspicious. 

"You await _my_ orders."

"Of course," says Starscream, by which he means, of course, _should it prove convenient_.

Megatron hums, giving him hostile optics as though he still doesn't believe him. He turns away and heads on down the corridor, heavy footsteps fading slowly.

Starscream's expression shifts as soon as his back is turned. He scowls after his enormous frame.

What Megatron knows about the sciences wouldn't fill a half cube. Starscream will have to check their transmission status himself—if they can get a message through to Soundwave on the Nemesis, or even to Shockwave on Cybertron, a shuttle or a drone with proper repair supplies can be sent with very little trouble to any of them.

Behind Starscream, the vehicons have relaxed with a creak of tyres and the sigh of air through opening ventilation systems. As though Starscream commands less fear than Megatron? His optics narrow.

"I think I told you to stop that solvent," he snaps. " _You_ obey _my_ commands—unless you want to end up like your friend over there. I assure you, it _can_ be arranged..."

He is very nearly talking to nobody: they start scrambling at the first syllable. The solvent's relentless trickling finally slowels, then stops.

The first order of business is to determine how secure they are for the time being, so having sent the vehicons off to assess repairs to critical systems and establish a perimeter, Starscream goes to check on their supplies. 

The crash, he discovers as he picks his way through the ship, has not been kind. Reports of critical systems arrive in a slow trickle. Atmosphere is out, which he could have told them from the appalling condensation beading at the seams around his canopy. Artificial gravity isn't operating, so what they get from the planet they've landed on is their only option—it's a little less than Cybertron, and fine to be going on with for now, but it will pose a challenge once they get back into space. The communications array and navigational systems are damaged, and the main engine is entirely offline.

They're lucky the emergency lighting, which glows from the floor around his feet at regular intervals, is even operating. The structure of the ship's outside is only compromised in a few places, too—it's internal systems, and not external ones, which must have caused the crash. 

Lucky for the engineering officer that he's already offline, Starscream thinks sourly. It's a kinder fate than what Starscream may have subjected him to, for this mess.

In the hold, the supply crates are ruptured. The dark walls are smeared with energon, which glows dully in the emergency lighting. It catches the subtle light of Starscream's optics, too, and turns a glossy and apocalyptic red under his gaze. 

The unrefined energon crystals have mixed with the fluid stuff, spilled across the floor in a gleaming cascade. But at least he can sweep them up, back into a barrel he patches up with debris and an ugly spot weld.

He finds a new reduction lens for the tiny (relatively speaking) energon refiner and starts it running on what remains of the fuel in the Recidivist's tanks. The last of the liquid fuel disappears into his own subspace. If those vehicons get hungry—well, he supposes they will have to wait for the refining, or... they can just lick the spill off the floor, if they're that desperate.

(Starscream has been that desperate, through the course of this long war, and his dignity rates lower than his survival. But he's not that desperate _now_ , and he does not intend on becoming so.)

He leaves the refiner running and then goes planetside to find out what they're working with, as the scanners are mostly inactive. 

The moment he steps out on the landing deck, Starscream is soaked with water— _salty_ water, in fact, which is even worse—and he very nearly turns tail and heads right back inside. That's disgusting.

He shudders. His plating clamps down tightly to protect the internal machinery of his body, but it doesn't stop him from smelling the salt and nervously imagining a rust infection.

The clouds above are thick and red, a lot like a sunset through a bombing run. There's been no bombing runs on this planet, though, because the inhabitants aren't showing many signs of intelligence. All his personal scanners can detect for mechanomiles is finger-sized, insecticon-like organic creatures. 

What does Megatron think he's even going to find out here, in terms of resources? Any abandoned research station would be stripped—it's what Starscream would order, and Megatron himself has ordered whole facilities burned down under those circumstances.

Starscream supposes they'll just have to try to work with whatever scrap he brings back anyway.

Or contact Soundwave.

Starscream transforms and rockets into the air, tetrajet form briefly uneasy in the strange atmosphere and disorienting rain. He adjusts rapidly. 

The clouds are thick, wet and hot. He powers through, straight up, engine roaring. The water boils against his plating, billowing away in seething red steam. It reeks of chemical contaminants: salt, and iron, and then inevitably rust.

Above, the sky is bright, greenish-blue with reflected light. And above that, the stars shine, tiny pinpricks of silver burning in and endless black void.

_Soundwave,_ Starscream sends. The communication signal is clearer the higher up he goes. There must be more than rust in that air. He puts on another burst of speed, ripping through the air. _Soundwave!_

Seconds pass. Then minutes. Starscream knows there will be lag, but the wait still itches. Every second that goes past makes him think that the initial and inattentive assessment Megatron made might be right—maybe the comms really won't connect out here. 

Maybe he needs to comm from outside atmosphere. That really will be a challenge. 

He flies higher, and then higher still. He wouldn't order another seeker so high unless he meant to lose them, but even as the sickening damp starts to turn to ice over the edges of his wings, Starscream knows he's always been more resilient than the rest. His engine rattles angrily.

**_Soundwave!_**

_Starscream_ , Soundwave's crackly transmission emerges from the static after a long moment. _Signal: weak._

Starscream smiles, private and invisible in his jet mode. 

_It seems our mighty leader doesn't know everything, after all,_ he thinks to himself, but he doesn't say it aloud. 

Soundwave receives enough to confirm that repair drones are on their way, and then Starscream drops back through the layer of foul, hot cloud cover.

There's still no sign of Megatron, which is just as well. He does perimeter sweep and gets the research facility on his sensors. It seems to be smoking, which is business as usual for Megatron. He returns to the landing pad of the Recidivist and touches down lightly.

His wings, when he transforms again, are streaked with long trailing stains from flying through the wet muck that passes for atmosphere on this planet. 

Starscream catches an insect between his claws and pulls a face as he crushes it completely. Then he goes back inside. 

The local star, burning a burnished, apocalyptic red through those clouds still, is beginning to set by the time Megatron returns.

Starscream is halfway to presentable, wiped down meticulously in the absence of working wash racks. He can hear him coming, crashing and staggering through the surrounding organic life. 

It doesn't sound right, he thinks, frowning. The... engine is rattling. The pounding steps are irregular. It's louder than even Megatron's gargantuan, ungraceful body should be.

His weapons systems cycle nervously, on then off again. They settle into an unhappy standby, loading missiles and raising charge, and Starscream goes to cautiously greet his master.

It is immediately apparent to Starscream, when he steps into the entryway next to the landing pad, that he needn't have bothered with the weapons systems at all.

Megatron's... not overcharged, exactly, he thinks critically. But he's not _not_ overcharged. His enormous, spiked frame seems to be largely outside the conscious control of his processor. He leans heavily on one wall, then stumbles with an almighty clank to the next, leaving long black streaks where the sharp edges of his armour grind against their planes.

"Ah... Master," says Starscream tentatively. 

Megatron's head jerks around. His optics fix on Starscream. They aren't focused correctly. 

"S—scream," slurs Megatron. The complicated combination of glyphs for 'Star' seems to have escaped his vocaliser on the first attempt. "Starscream," he manages on the second try, overcorrecting for clarity.

Starscream steps deftly out of his way, leaving Megatron to catch himself on a wall with one huge, silvery paw. A moment later he overbalances and falls into it shoulder-first with a crash. 

"Master, you are not well," Starscream notes, twitching out of reach of the second massive hand. "What did you come across, in that facility?"

Or, perhaps more accurately, what has come across Megatron?

"Nothing. Dust and ashes. Nothing... I am well enough," says Megatron. This is self evidently a frightfully untrue statement.

Starscream does not quite dodge the next swipe of his hand—Megatron is faster than he looks, and even though he is clearly under the influence of some vile compound, his reflexes haven't entirely left him.

Starscream yelps. Megatron's grip— as well as the rest of him when he reels Starscream's protesting form in—is melting hot. The heat leaks out from between his plates, stinging where it touches Starscream's. 

He wriggles, testing the grip. He's not getting crushed or shot or shaken, so he doesn't know quite what Megatron wants with him. For a moment Megatron's face with its haggard lines and sharp teeth looms.

He bends his enormous and heavy bulk and rubs the side of his face on the smooth curve of Starscream's shoulder. Starscream goes very still for a moment. Megatron's vents are wide open and leaking hot air, and he sucks in air through his mouth. Is he smelling Starscream? 

There is a loud _screee_ as the sharp tips of Megatron's claws scrape on the flat of Starscream's wing. The vibration of it makes him shudder.

With a sudden acrobatic twist Starscream frees himself and backs up even further. 

"Star... scream," growls Megatron, lumbering towards him once more. He's steaming into the air. His shadow falls over Starscream's much smaller frame. 

Starscream doesn't let him grab him again—he backs up frantically, keeping his optics firmly on Megatron. 

"Ah, now, now, Master, let's not be—hasty..."

He's not sure exactly what Megatron actually wants with him, since he is yet to be attacked and few of Megatron's weapons systems are online. But he knows he doesn't want to be caught while Megatron is so... not himself. 

His fuel pump thumps fiercely in his chest. He needs to immobilise Megatron and then figure out what's gone wrong with him. That's a tall order—if Megatron had been so easy to immobilise, the Autobots would have done it by now. 

But he's obviously not thinking clearly. He shouldn't be too hard to outsmart. Surely.

Starscream takes another step back and then glances down the corridor, getting his bearings—and he then has to scramble away again because Megatron notices that moment of inattentiveness and grabs for him again. 

Starscream's thrusters screech as they scrape on the floor, a loud soundtrack to his frantic movement. 

There's nowhere to back up—he hits the cold wall of the Recidivist's poorly-lit corridor. 

"Master—!" Starscream sees Megatron's hand coming and drops to his knees. The sound of Megatron's claws slamming into the wall above his wings makes him flinch. He squeezes his optics closed instinctively for a second. 

Megatron grunts in confusion and sags drunkenly against the wall, which gives Starscream the perfect, if utterly undignified, opportunity to just... squirm out between his massive silvery thighs. 

He has to roll over to angle his wing out. It is worth it. 

There's a long moment where Megatron reviews the wall in evident confusion, like he's not quite sure what it's done with Starscream.

Starscream wonders several things in quick succession: if it is a trap to draw him in closer, if he should leave Megatron contemplating the wall, how he's going to draw him out—

"My master," he simpers cautiously from a safe distance.

Megatron's helm swings around, optics struggling to fix on Starscream.

With great care and no small degree of anxiety, Starscream lures him into the destroyed wash racks. The dead vehicon is still where Starscream last saw it, propping up all that weight of ship's debris.

One step, two, and then he's right where Starscream wants him.

Megatron would never fall for it in his right mind, but his right mind seems to be on holiday thanks to whatever nonsense the miserable Autobots on this filthy little planet once cooked up in that facility. 

At last, Starscream powers up his native weapons system and, while Megatron is still slowly reacting to the familiar whine of its charge, he shoots the dead vehicon. With the squeal of protesting metal, it's blown right out from under the remaining debris. 

The wall gives a tormented groan. Then, while Megatron is still peering up at it in confusion, the debris comes tumbling down right on top of him.

Spilled solvent splashes everywhere. Starscream nimbly gets out of the way of the falling parts, and when he wipes his optics clear, Megatron is at least mostly trapped beneath the mess. 

He isn't saying Starscream's name anymore, just grunting and reaching dumbly for him. 

That can't be good. Megatron is dramatic and he loves to hear himself talk. He says Starscream's name even when he knows Starscream is in no position where he might possibly answer...

As Starscream watches, he slaps one huge hand on the floor, digs his claws right in, and heaves. His prodigious and improbable strength means that he does, actually, cause the debris to shift... a little. His vents crack open. Even more boiling gasses pour forth, rippling against the solvent on the floor. 

...Starscream is going to have to find a new way to restrain him to figure out what's wrong with him. 

There are cuffs for the brig, in case they take prisoners instead of just shooting Autobots offline. Megatron has the codes for them, but Starscream doubts he can think of them right now. 

"I'll be—I'll return in a moment," he promises. He's not sure if Megatron knows what he's saying, and even if he does, mighty Megatron is in no position to force Starscream to stay. There's no true need to pander to him with stammering promises and half truths.

Starscream dances out of the way of an enormous silver hand and darts out of the room.

He wants those cuffs.

Getting the restraints is easy. 

By the time Starscream returns to the wash racks, though, Megatron's plating is cracked wide open in more places than just his vents: all of his access panels are popped wide, from his arms to his chest to the tiny one in his neck. 

Starscream looks at them, all yawning wide to show the delicate gleam of pins and the thick coils of cables. He wonders if it's actually helping to cool him down at all. He's unable to quite tear his gaze from the shameless display.

He disregards it as well as he can. It's just a symptom of some kind of disorder. He just has to find out what kind before anything else goes wrong. If Megatron is properly out of commission, that's one thing, but if he's going to recover in half an hour, it would be non-ideal for him to remember Starscream as the one who tried to kick him out the airlock.

Getting the restraints is easy, but getting the restraints _on to Megatron_ is a... whole experience.

He almost gives up several times. Better just to shoot him and put them all out of their misery, really. 

Regrettably, under the present circumstances, helping Megatron must be viewed as a matter of some self interest, at least until Soundwave's supplies arrive. If anyone asks, Starscream can tell them it's blind loyalty.

When the cuffs are, finally, on, Starscream has a dent in one wing and a long scuff down the side of his leg. Megatron is mostly free of the debris and entirely soaked in solvents. 

The preliminary medical scans show changed chemical levels, but they're not anything Starscream immediately recognises.

Feeling spiteful, and still dripping from the struggle, Starscream is not gentle when he takes a fuel sample. Megatron twitches and wriggles as though the tiny syringe Starscream uses actually might pose a real threat to his huge frame, which is a fascinating insight on its own. 

He has to leave for fuel analysis, and there's something a little unsettling about leaving Megatron squirming his massive frame around in the debris and solvents. It seems... forlorn and odd. But there's no further staff to contain him. Starscream isn't risking his own aft to make Megatron _more comfortable_. 

He's halfway down to the minute medical lab before he remembers to send a communication to the surviving vehicons warning them away from the wash racks. He can't risk them opening the doors and freeing Megatron. Or getting killed, he guesses, but that's really a secondary concern. 

The lab results are both enlightening and... not. Starscream doesn't like them one bit. 

They mean he's going to have to get back into grabbing range. 

Starscream ends up back in the wash racks, perched on a tall bit of the ventilation system, which has come down along with select pieces of the roof. He glowers down at the battered grey bulk of Megatron.

The room is so full of steam that the wash racks might have been in full and heavy use, but it's just the heat wafting off Megatron's frame. His movements are even less coordinated now, twitchy and erratic. Everything smells of overheat: the incredibly specific scent of boiling coolants and hot, hot metal. 

Megatron is useless like this, even to Starscream.

He's not dying, though. And he's not falling offline, even though his optics are dim and he's not making sense. There's still plenty of activity in Megatron's huge, uncoordinated body. Through the cracks between his plates, Starscream can see the plush glossy texture of his protoform, gleaming metal contracting and twitching with abortive little movements. 

While Megatron isn't drunk, exactly, he _is_ overcharged. Just not from imbibing too much high grade. 

It's not the sort of condition anyone sees in modern mechanisms. Cybertronian medics have long since patched any tendency towards this sort of nonsense—their species has no need to communicate via hardline interfacing anymore, and their savage, ugly bonding orgies are long since lost to time. If they were even real in the first place. Starscream's not a historian.

But the unfortunate fact remains that what Megatron needs is a few overloads—hard ones, Starscream suspects, watching him critically as he twitches in the hissing solvent. 

He hops down from his debris with a delicate tap-tap of his thrusters. The solvent splashes around them but it's drowned out by the noises of Megatron's fans and the hissing it the boiling fluids around him. 

_Tap, tap_. Starscream picks his way cautiously closer. He feels the very moment Megatron's dim, unfocused gaze fixes on him, caught by his approach.

No, he thinks critically. Megatron is too big and his systems are too well reinforced. His frame will take nothing less than the kind of overload that locks up all your joints and leaves you steaming and drooling onto the berth.

Starscream smiles down at him. 

He leans over and lays one hand flat to his chest plates. There's a seam beneath them, running across his abdomen, allowing him flexibility and range of movement. Starscream hooks one sharp claw into it and runs it along, listening to the soft, bright _shiiiing_ of metal on metal.

There's a strained engine whine, virbating the plates under Starscream's claw. Megatron gives a full-body shudder, which is gratifying.

The restraints have struggle room. It was almost impossible to get them on him in the first place. Getting them properly tightened would have been even worse, so of course they do. 

Now that he knows why Megatron is so very determined to grab Starscream—and what that strange, savage rubbing and sniffing business likely meant, before—it makes him feel flattered and powerful, watching Megatron struggle stupidly towards him. 

But it isn't going to get the giant oaf anywhere, of course. 

"Stop thrashing," he tells him, trying to predict Megatron's squirming. He is still reaching for Starscream, rather desperately. But he's held down—for now, at least. "Or I'll stop." He lifts his fingers away from the armoured seam he's been playing with, just to illustrate.

This cruel threat prompts a sad whine—oh, how Starscream wishes he'd thought to record this to keep _that_ pathetic little complaint forever—but doesn't stop him moving around in the slightest. Megatron's processor is running so fast, charged so high, he might not even understand what Starscream's saying—only that he has stopped touching him.

Starscream knows he won't really stop. Megatron, laid out on the floor and streaked with solvent and grimy condensation and _needy_ and _vulnerable_ , just for him, is the headiest, sexiest thing he can conceive of. The very smell of Megatron overheating sets off a cascade of processes in Starscream's core emotional modules. He's touching him again before he even thinks about it. 

Megatron's mouth opens to wheeze out another plume of steam when he slides his cable's connector teasingly over the opening of his port. But he does plug in, finally, and then it's so _easy_.

Megatron's charge resistance is at an all-time low, his capacitors are half full already just with sheer wanting it. All Starscream has to do is hit him with his own charge, one hard sharp burst of it, and Megatron goes hurtling over the edge of overload. 

He groans, all low and shocked and helpless to resist it, and then as Starscream watches—oh, hungrily—his frame locks up, more gasses leaking from between the seams with a hot pneumatic hiss. He is tense like this for long, long seconds, until he begins to shake, until his vocaliser gives out with a crackle, until his optics flicker, briefly, then go dark.

Finally he melts back into his restraints with another wordless whine, soft and shockingly cute as it emerges from such a big mech. His optics flicker on again, dim and hazy. 

"Starscream," he says, in his deep hollow voice, scratchy and staticky.

Starscream's whole body seems to throb in response. His wings flutter at his back, open and demanding. He can see Megatron's hazy optics track their movements. 

This is the first sensible thing he's said in hours, which Starscream supposes is proof enough that this is working. 

"Why am I—" he tugs at one arm, more focused than before. The restraints creak. They won't hold if Megatron is really thinking critically about how to get free. Starscream isn't exactly working with state of the art materials here. "—tied down?" 

It doesn't seem to have occurred to him that Starscream is plugged into him and that that, too, is perhaps uncommon. Starscream can feel why, though: his processes are running faster and faster again, his fans growing louder instead of quieter, his coolant evaporating to steam, streaming upwards from the gaps in his plating. As soon as it leaves him it cools again, and then it condenses, leaving long streaks on the silvery plates.

Clearly just one overload won't do it. Starscream... finds he doesn't mind. 

"You're sick," Starscream says vaguely, and then combs through his automatic firewalls to find a weakness big enough to wiggle through. 

Megatron is not suffering an overabundance of clarity right now. It would be a good time to take advantage—Starscream doesn't even need to kill him when he can simply tear through his processor. He could excise his personality and free will like a surgeon cutting out an unfortunate growth. 

The thought that he may need Megatron yet to get off this planet stays his hand. For now. It's such a flimsy excuse, and later he'll wonder, but in the moment he's just glad to have one.

Really the best thing about this is how _helpless_ Megatron is.

"Starscream," he begins, starting strong, so tough and glowering and hostile even through his evident confusion. By the time he gets to the final syllable, he trails into a loud, slurred moan. He stops talking and stares at nothing, vents wide open and fans heaving, while Starscream transfers tiny little routines that play his sensory system like a vibrolin. 

The second overload seems harder on him: Starscream can hear the frantic click-click-clicks of Megatron's overwhelmed primary processor, can see the steam and smoke. He can smell the burning fluids.

It's _still_ easy for Starscream though. Megatron's so primed for it. The third is even easier, and although his thrashing through it snaps part of one of the restraints—doing with main strength what he can't manage with his processor, alarmingly—Megatron doesn't even try to free himself. His contaminated frame is getting exactly what it wants, and in the interim all he does is sag and grunt soft little noises of helpless pleasure and blast more blistering air through his vents.

Starscream doesn't stop to check in with him now. He won't bother until he can measure Megatron's activity back at its baseline, and it seems one or two hard overloads won't be enough. 

...it might not be enough for Starscream, either, really. 

Megatron would not like to think it, but he's at his best like this: his huge, overwhemingly powerful form at Starscream's dubious mercy, twitching and whining while Starscream pumps him full of confused bliss, entirely at his leisure.

Starscream licks his teeth and rubs along the edge of Megatron's interface panel with one finger, peering shamelessly at the enticing shadows and the thick coil of cabling inside. He can't help but contemplate the sheer amount of power Megatron can pump through those, even though he also knows Megatron isn't thinking about his cables right this second—from their connection and Megatron's failing firewalls, Starscream knows he isn't thinking much of anything, actually, except for the dull throb of how ungodly high his charge is, and how good he feels, and whether Starscream can rip another hard, trembling, gasping overload from him. (Yes, Starscream sends idly, of course he can. Megatron grunts again, and his optics flicker off then on once more.)

Starscream doesn't let him stew in the anticipation for long, because he can't stand it himself. He lets the program he's slapped together build up charge in sharp, spiralling little jolts that overlap just a little, just enough, one following its predecessor just before the sensation fades entirely. 

Megatron's frame moves with the little bursts after only a few moments, shifting and contracting with each jolt of feeling, and then he's grunting each time, and then his mouth hangs open and he growls, "Starscream," again. 

Starscream would like to think of himself as distant, here—cool and stoic and detached, the untouchable master, unaffected. 

But he's not. He feels almost as overwhelmed as Megatron. He loves seeing him like this. Everything going on right now is utterly outside Megatron's control—he may have wanted it at first, but now he's driven only by the sensations of his frame, which are all _Starscream's_ choice. 

Megatron goes over again. Starscream can see a flicker of light, ignited energon, right between the seams of his armour. His frame is absolutely merciless with him, and with his firewalls in shambles Starscream can watch it every time: the unforgiving spikes in his fuel chemistry, how his internal components give huge, heaving contractions with every overload.

Megatron's big, armoured thighs shake uncontrollably when he finally relaxes again. In fact, a great deal of him shakes. He is exhausted. He's sheened with condensation. He's leaking steam into the cool air. 

Starscream checks. His processes aren't quite back to their baseline. 

So Starscream overloads him again, listening to the slurred, soft, little noises he makes as he does. It's very appealing, and he strokes his cheek. If Megatron even registers this terrible, unbearably fond touch, he doesn't respond. 

He might not have the energy.

His face is slack and his optics are glazed and distant. Starscream likes it. He looks so open, like Starscream could lean down and gobble up the very essence of him, drink it hot and fresh like fuel syphoned right from his mouth.

He leans down and kisses Megatron's slack lips. He's a big, scarred, hard mech. Starscream is almost puzzled to find his mouth is soft like anybody else's. He sets his teeth in and bites, not very gently, and feels it give beneath his teeth.

Megatron leans into it, engines deep in his chest giving a startled rumble.

Starscream overloads him again, listening intently to his incoherent little noises. He watches his face and strokes his cheek and cannot seem to look away from the indentation he left in his lower lip, a perfect impression of one of Starscream's teeth. Ah.

He begins to wonder how many overloads it's going to take to bring his base level back to what his logs say is normal. Megatron's big, rugged frame is tough, but it isn't invincible.

Starscream skims his fingers over the seams of Megatron's armour, over his shoulder, across his chest plates. Nobody is ever allowed to touch Megatron so casually—even the medics are wary of him—and Starscream is delighted by the sting of boiling fumes on the sensors of his claws as he explores freely. As he does, he stirs up the charge almost idly, adding his own attentive little touches, making the signals crash into each other.

Megatron's face would be funny under other circumstances: mouth slack, optics squinting and unfocused, a cute little crease in that soft metal where pleasure has contorted his features.

Another overload floods him at Starscream's coaxing, and another again shortly after, overwhelming his processor. Megatron makes a tiny, luxurious little noise that burns through Starscream's whole interfacing system, and then his frame clenches and squeezes like some enormous fist, wringing him out. 

With one last tremendous, shaking arch, his optics at last go totally dark: lights out, nobody home.

His charge levels even out, even as his fans howl like they're trying to take off. Starscream unplugs and steps back, wobbly on his thrusters.

He's throbbing with charge of his own, but Megatron is clearly incapable of reciprocating... which really just figures, he decides bitterly. Typical Megatron.

Starscream stumbles back to his seat high up on the rubble pile, away from the heat Megatron is putting out—and also out of easy swiping range, if he comes to in a foul mood.

But Megatron does not come to in a foul mood. He grunts, a short, sharp little noise, when he reboots fully a few moments later. Starscream can see the lucidity now in the way he looks around at his surroundings, in the way his mouth tugs down when he sees the grimy streaks left on his plating by the condensation.

His dim red optics land on Starscream, and his mouth pulls in a new way. His expression is... complicated. He heaves himself up upon one elbow. 

"Get out," he growls, in a voice that sounds like he's been gargling gravel. He sounds exhausted. 

Starscream's wings twitch. He blinks once, a whirring click of his optical lenses.

"No thanks for my services, master?" he asks. Starscream has never found a boundary he didn't want to push... at least a little. 

"Out!" snarls Megatron. Strained hydraulics creak as he begins to get up, no doubt to show Starscream the door with all due force.

Starscream flinches. He gets out. 

They don't talk about it. 

Soundwave sends their supplies. Megatron pretends that this isn't evidence of Starscream going behind his back to contact him in the first place. It is unclear if he even remembers what his orders were. 

The Recidivist, two vehicons and its commanders make it off the planet, of course. 

And still, they don't talk about it—even when Megatron grudgingly adds the fuel analysis to his own medical profile.

But Starscream remembers it, and sometimes he can't help but revisit the memory files. Megatron: huge, terrible, alluring Megatron, laid out for him, helpless and all his for the taking. Like a _feast._

And sometimes, when he meets Megatron's optics in a quiet second on one of the good—well, the _better_ bad days, anyway—he thinks Megatron remembers it pretty clearly, too.

**Author's Note:**

> I thought (back in July now lol) that it was about time to dope Megatron up with some sex pollen instead! 
> 
> Anyway, if you liked something about this one please feel free to let me know via a comment. 
> 
> I'm on tumblr at [cardio-vore](https://cardio-vore.tumblr.com) and twitter as [fascination_ex](https://twitter.com/fascination_ex) if you wanna come chat about ~~soft megastar content~~ fic or whatever


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